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If any one goes on a booze cruise to France be sure to pick up a bottle..or two.. of Kirsh.
It's 40% proof....now I've got your attention!!
Then you take a big jar or Rumtopf and put in equal amount of cherries and sugar. Cover with Kirsh. Cover the pot/jar and stir once -twice a day till it stops fermenting with a NON metalic spoon.
It's great. In fact it's fantastic. The fruit is good for trifles on ice-cream etc and the liqiour is like a liquer.

Hands up who wants to go on a booze cruize

Jill

last time I did one of them it exploded

How did you manage that? I make Rumtopf most years (one of those German things we do...), but I do recommend using the 54% rum. Very difficult to get in this country; Lidl had it once as a special, but not since then. (They asked me if I was aware of what I was buying when I bought three at once!) With that alcohol level you only need half the amount of sugar as fruit. If you use as much sugar as fruit, and make sure that all the fruit is sound and clean, nothing like exploding should happen even with a 40% spirit.

Even if you leave it sitting in the cupboard for too long, like for a few years... Which is unlikely to occur in any household that is not anti-alcoholic!

no idea, presumably it got contaminated with something, but it was a month or so old and bubbling away, we went out (on a hot day), came home and the pot was in pieces with fruity alcohol all over the walls.

I've been a bit scared to try it since. We'd done one the year before which was perfectly OK. Would warmth do it? It was probably in the sun thinking about it....

The version I know is a whole season thing, you add more fruit and sugar as the soft fruit ripen in turn through the summer. You start with strawberries and sugar, cover with very strong liqueur, then press it down with a weighted plate.

As the summer progress, you add apricots, cherries, raspberries, grapes, currants, plums and peaches (plus more sugar and alchohol). I was told not to use blackberries as they stain the Rumtopf and can make it bitter (is this true?).

Once all the fruit is in, you leave it until Christmas.

(This version came from an elderly lady who was one of the Germans expelled from Stettin in the 1950s.)

It sounds a bit like the Eau De Vie they do in France - this is made up of fruit and sugar, level by level, then given to a bloke who will turn it into the liquor of about 40% alcohol. Have to say tho, its really disgusting and just tastes of alcohol

Ina I think you made the mistake of using a sealed jar, Rumtopfs lids just sit on top so the air /gases can escape.

Stonehead I've done the all season one as well..very good. It's just that I've got 5 cherry trees so there was rather a lot of cherries..infact I ended up pipping over 2,000 of the little things..worth it though.

Any other alcoholic recipes gratefully received.

Jill

We used Kirsch instead of eau de vie because Kirsch is like cherry eau de vie so the flavour was even stronger.

Jill
i

we had a rumtopf once. We put fruit and sugar and rum in it and it turned into this overripe fruity mess that smelt horrible and went mouldy. Think Dad chucked the rumtopf because it smelt even after going through the dishwasher.